so, i took a screencap of the table from an older revision of the IQ and Wealth of Nations page. it’s a jpeg so don’t try to sort the results. (~_^) you can still manipulate the table on the revision page, though. (click on image below for a LARGER, non-fuzzy version. should open in new tab/window — you might have to click on it there to super-size it.)

yeah, i’m aware that there are problems with lynn and vanhanen’s data, although i haven’t followed the iq stuff all that closely so i’m not familiar with what the exact problems are (thanks for those links, btw!).

what someone ought to do — someone who’s looking for a nice weekend hobby — someone with a LOT of spare time on their hands (i.e. not me) and access to an academic library — is to just sit down and double-check all of the figures. make a new and more accurate table. skip the rounding up and down stuff, too — we’re all grown ups — we can handle decimals.

Most of the criticism of Lynn, especially that which discusses at best rounding errors, is pretty much rubbish. The critics of Lynn’s numbers obsesses over minute differences in figures that, really, in the end, don’t make much of a difference to the overall picture. I take that as a sign of how much of an argument his critics actually have. I’m actually in the process of doing what HBD Chick suggested, and let me tell you, it is a lot of work. ;)

Yes, Lynn needs to be more careful with his numbers, especially since he knows that nurturists are going to go through them with a fine toothed comb. But despite a few quibbles here and there, his results pretty much hold up. A lot of the challenges seem to come from smart people from lower-IQ countries who resent their countries’ ranking (i.e. Greeks, Portuguese, Irish, Kenyans, etc.). Just human nature, I guess.

@jayman – “The critics of Lynn’s numbers obsesses over minute differences in figures that, really, in the end, don’t make much of a difference to the overall picture. I take that as a sign of how much of an argument his critics actually have.”

@toddy cat – “A lot of the challenges seem to come from smart people from lower-IQ countries who resent their countries’ ranking (i.e. Greeks, Portuguese, Irish, Kenyans, etc.). Just human nature, I guess.”

yeah, i suppose. i don’t really get the problem, tho — my people are a bunch of sorta low-ish iq people and i don’t have difficulties with it. i mean, i know myself — most of my extended family members are not very bright. (~_^) it is what it is.

i’ve gotten a little push-back around here with the inbreeding/outbreeding/altruism ideas, too. i think, like iq, some people might not want to hear it. again, my peeps are one of those peripheral european groups that are kinda inbred and i don’t have a problem with it. what can you do?

Sure, his ideas _in general_ do hold water. However, there is a lot of … hmm I lack english word here. untidyness? carelessness? involved with his research.
Also, it’s not that his opponents are criticising his minor changes to number, but also sometimes his choice of articles. E.g. the whole cycle of subsaharan iq, and criticism of Wechsler. Definetely Lynn was the first one, who started the whole thing about national IQ and as such, his articles are classics. However, he is not God impersonate.

@HBD Chick:“i think, like iq, some people might not want to hear it. again, my peeps are one of those peripheral european groups that are kinda inbred and i don’t have a problem with it. what can you do?”

I think also it’s hope. Acknowledging that one’s people has a low average IQ takes away any aspiration of those people seriously improving their lot in life en masse. In the States, I would think all the less successful groups think that one day they’ll “make it” and no longer be relegated to widespread poverty. For that, one can’t really blame them.

Critics of Lynn, I think, really, attacking Lynn for having the audacity to do something that’s going to be “untidy” and inherently difficult; that is, getting reliable IQ data for sub-Saharan Africa. Considering the local conditions, reliable data from the continent is going to be hard to come by. Any critic can make complaints here and there because one must make trade-offs in reviewing the literature. I will say I have a good deal of Lynn’s data and what I’ve seen so far only confirms his findings there.

@jayman – “Acknowledging that one’s people has a low average IQ takes away any aspiration of those people seriously improving their lot in life en masse.”

yes, accept reality and based on that, alter one’s expectations — i agree — that would be a good place for everybody to be.

i think this about the greeks whenever i read about the economic crisis there. i’ve been to greece — love it there! but i think the greeks (and all the peripheral europeans) just need to accept that they’ll never quite manage as well as the germans, and they should just put out of their minds the idea that one day all of them will be able to drive around in mercedes benzs. just not gonna happen. and so what?! greece is a fracking beautiful country with a very nice climate! just hang on to it and enjoy life. (^_^)

@hbd chick “they should just put out of their minds the idea that one day all of them will be able to drive around in mercedes benzs. just not gonna happen” Maybe. But didn’t
Edison say his inventions were 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration? He was really successful and maybe he had a point. The Greek retirement age has been really low. Those are your most experienced and intellectually productive people. There might be rroom for more work to make up for any other difference.

@Jayman
But you _have_ read the Wechsler articles? Because Wechsler analysed which articles were taken by Lynn, and which were denounced, and he found no consistent criterium, except one: the lower was IQ, the greater chance of the study to be accepted.

Yes, I have seen them. In fact, those articles are the whole reason I’m doing my own analysis of Lynn’s data. From what I found so far, the short explanation is that the reason that low IQ seems to be the only consistent criterion is because the real average IQ is low (~70). Being that that is the case, studies that report significantly higher averages are likely to be off in one way or another.

@linton – “Maybe. But didn’t Edison say his inventions were 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration? He was really successful and maybe he had a point.”

he was probably just being polite/modest. (~_^) he was clever and likely he knew it and just didn’t want other people around him to feel so bad that they weren’t so clever. i’m sure he worked hard, but it helps to be clever from the starting point, too.

@linton – “The Greek retirement age has been really low. Those are your most experienced and intellectually productive people. There might be rroom for more work to make up for any other difference.”

that’s true. the greeks could work longer. i still don’t think they’ll ever match the germans or the japanese, but maybe they could get closer to central italians or something like that.

@hbd chick “he (Edison) was clever and likely he knew it and just didn’t want other people around him to feel so bad that they weren’t so clever.” Yes, quite possibly. I read New Age stuff a lot, and their line generally is that Edison at leasst wanted everybody to think he was smarter than Tesla, particularly Tesla. So I didn’t consider that one.

It was bugging me that I couldn’t figure out why the Irish are so… Dumb (relatively).

>i think the greeks (and all the peripheral europeans) just need to accept that they’ll never quite manage as well as the germans

(Because they inbreed)… That would be really good at explaining why the central part of Europe is so much more intelligent. But where is your evidence that peripheral Europe had more inbreeding? Your one post I saw on that topic only said that the church banned inbreeding but Ireland ignored that rule…

@yoda – “It was bugging me that I couldn’t figure out why the Irish are so… Dumb (relatively). (Because they inbreed)…”

you might be interested in this in which one researcher has found a correlation between cousin marriage and iq.

as i said elsewhere, though:

“i’ve been thinking that all the inbreeding in the muslim world may have led to some inbreeding depression and, therefore, low iqs….

“but i’ve also been wondering lately if an additional effect of all the fbd cousin marriage on iq might be that, since fbd marriage seems to lead to societies based on tribes (i think it does anyway), perhaps low iq individuals are not weeded out of the population/gene pool since the tribe sorta takes care of them and even helps them along in life to the point where they are able to even reproduce (see last two paragraphs in this post for an example of how this works). i mean, if you’re living in a tribal society in which cousin marriage is common and you’re kinda slow, you might just be married off to one of your cousins who is also a little slow. and the extended family looks out for you guys, so there you go … low iqs not weeded out of the population.

@yoda – “‘i think the greeks (and all the peripheral europeans) just need to accept that they’ll never quite manage as well as the germans’

(Because they inbreed)… That would be really good at explaining why the central part of Europe is so much more intelligent.”

yes, because they inbreed, but i am thinking not only of intelligence but also about a whole range of social behaviors and how these differ between inbred and outbred peoples. you might want to start here to see what i mean. (^_^)

@yoda – “But where is your evidence that peripheral Europe had more inbreeding? Your one post I saw on that topic only said that the church banned inbreeding but Ireland ignored that rule…”

check down below ↓ in the left-hand column in the Mating Patterns in Europe Series. you might want to begin with the start here page first, though, and then move on to the mating patterns series. keep in mind that this is all a work in progress…. (~_^)

@yoda – “Note: I don’t think the Irish are actually that (92) dumb. When Irish adults, who better reflect genetics, were tested they scored 98.”

what i’d be interested to know about the irish iq scores is in which regions of the island were the various tests conducted (jayman?)? we know that there are iq differences between northern and southern italy and spain, arguably due to the populations having different backgrounds (and/or inbreeding). what about the irish iq scores? northern ireland (and dublin?) with its population of scots/anglo-scots might score quite differently from other segments of the island’s population.

@yoda – “BTW, hbdchick, what is your ethnicity?”

well, i’d rather not say on the innerwebs. there is a slight chance that someone might work out my real identity, and i don’t want to be watsoned, you know? (not that there’s much to be watsoned, but i do like my small, peaceful life.)

i will say, though, that my people do hail from one of the inbred peripheral nations of europe. thankfully my parents come from different parts of that country, so i’m not too inbred. (~_^) and there is likely a drop of the germanic in us on one side, which no doubt accounts for my love of pilsner. (^_^)

@sNoOOpy Einstein “was slightly eccentric.” Cool. Eccentric, yes. Wrong perhaps. But according to my father, who was at Princeton at the same time as Einstein, the famous man once remarked that he would swap all of his accomplishments for grandchildren, and I take it he was quite clever.
Your references are delightful.
Many years ago I constructed an interferometer using a PVC pipe about twenty or thirty feet long and a lazer, beam splitter, mirror and so forth. Using a household vacuum cleaner I ran air through it one way and then the other. The shift in the interference bands was different in the two directions. It was consistent with the simple addition of velocities not the complex relationship observed by Fisseau and re-figured by Lorenz.
I didn’t get into any cosmic issues, just what was happening in my apartment. Of course my efforts received little enthusiams from the experts and I now suppose I was just wrong: maybe the resistance at the two ends of the pipe was not identical and that meant that the vacuum artefact was different. But it was all kind of fun.

Thanks for the replies. Your ideas look very promising and ill read in to them. I never considered the inbreeding aspect as so strong in determining both iq and culture… (Maybe vise versa too).

To strengthen your argument maybe you should take a handed at the Japanese and Koreans vs says the southeast asians. I still think climate had an important role in people’s iq but your intra European analysis really opens up the door. Thanks

@yoda – “I still think climate had an important role in people’s iq….”

oh, absolutely! that’s probably one of, if not the, major selection pressures on intelligence. but there is also this inbreeding thing which ought to be explored, i think. it might be another layer on top of all the environmental stuff, you know?

myself, i’m not so focused on iq … more interested in the altruism/social behaviors side of humans. (^_^)

@hbd chick “myself, i’m not so focused on iq … more interested in the altruism/social behaviors side of humans”
I like that. It seems to me that iq, if it’s true it’s higher at higher lattitudes, would be pretty easy to explain. If you completely mess up at seventy degrees you’ll probably live to mess up again. Not so at forty below. And I’ll bet if you looked you’d find evidence that the ability to keep quiet and not get put out of the house follows the temperature as well. Maybe altruism, too.
When it comes to consanguinity I have an uneasy feeling. For those who do it, it seems so right that the tendency might be hardwired, not just a tradition. That makes sense. It probably is the same way in animals. For those who avoid it, it raises an absolute phobia, something I deal with all the time. That might be hardwired, too. It’s like nature takes the attitude “If you’re strategy is going to lead to fertility and long term survival, keep it up. If your strategy is going to be outbreed and lose long term survivial, keep that up. There are too many of you anyway.”
I hope that’s wrong. I hope people can be rational. But hey, there’s nothing I can do about that, is there?

” I never considered the inbreeding aspect as so strong in determining both iq and culture… (Maybe vise versa too).”

For a discussion of the various forces affecting the evolution of IQ, see here (my blog). I’m working on a post taking a closer look at Europe and the Middle East….

“To strengthen your argument maybe you should take a handed at the Japanese and Koreans vs says the southeast asians. I still think climate had an important role in people’s iq but your intra European analysis really opens up the door.”

…which I will follow up with a look at East and Southeast Asia. My long range plans include looking at sub-Saharan Africa as well.

@linton – “‘myself, i’m not so focused on iq … more interested in the altruism/social behaviors side of humans’

“I like that.”

don’t get me wrong. i think that iq is extremely important when it comes to success in life, both for individuals and groups. it’s just not my particular hobbyhorse. (~_^)

@linton – “When it comes to consanguinity I have an uneasy feeling. For those who do it, it seems so right that the tendency might be hardwired….”

yes. i’ve wondered about the role of genetic sexual attraction here: if people are attracted the most to others with whom they share a lot of genes, maybe then in an inbred society, people are even more attracted to their relatives because they are even more related to them. in an outbreeding society the attraction wouldn’t be so strong. that’s my guess anyway.

@ hbd chick. “don’t know where the finnish fit in. must take a look at them.” You’re being coy about your ethnic background, but I guess we can rule out Finninsh. As for me I once took an interests and found the names of over 2 dozen direct ancestors all of whom spoke different languages. Of course it took a long time to accumulate that many. So I would say my background is outbred beyond the call of sanity. If you can’t say what your background is, how’s about saying whether you regard yourself as having few or many ethnic groups in your ancestry. Just for fun of course.

@linton – “how’s about saying whether you regard yourself as having few or many ethnic groups in your ancestry.”

well, as far as immediate ancestry goes the answer is few — just one in fact. one parent came from “the motherland” and my other parent’s parents came from the same country — from different parts of that country, so i’m a tad outbred. (~_^)

there is some remote ancestry on one side that is germanic (determined by my father’s y-chromosome haplogroup). there is also some possible germanic introgression on mom’s side, but i don’t know about that for sure. in both cases the germanic genes were probably introduced in the medieval period (that includes early medieval period) so who knows how many of them are left in our little familial gene pool.

i have said somewhere else before that i was raised as a catholic, so that kinda narrows down the possibilities a little more.

that’s all the hints i’m gonna give! (^_^)

@linton – “As for me I once took an interests and found the names of over 2 dozen direct ancestors all of whom spoke different languages. Of course it took a long time to accumulate that many. So I would say my background is outbred beyond the call of sanity.”

@ hbd chick “you are definitely outbred” So let’s hope that there isn’t much to this “outbreeding makes you smart” thing. I’d rather be wrong that be right and not have it realized until everyone else was sufficiently outbred to understand. That would probably be too late.

Oops, I misread your post. So you’re not Irish? Are you trying to hint that you are Sicilian? But that’s not a country… I’m confused

@jayman

It’s funny you give me a link to Davidski. He is actually the person I’m going to argue against. He thinks that r1b initially spread through western Europe by a male line of iberian bell beakers. And he thinks r1b came to iberia, late neolithic, from west Asia via the Mediterranean.

I agree that the bell beakers probably spread r1b in western European but I think the r1b line was introduced into the bell beaker culture from eastern/central europe.

I’ll give you a link when I have made my post, but first I have read all this material…

@g.w. & yoda – it’s fair enough to ask — and i think it’s relevant for the discussion here to know whether the blog authoress (moi!) is from an inbred or an outbred group. (^_^) could/would no doubt make a difference to my outlook on life. so, again, for the record, i’m from one of the rather inbred european groups with some dashes from an outbred group.

someone else asked once before if i am jewish, which can also be relevant in hbd discussions. again: nope. not jewish.

and, of course, i’m a chick! talk about making a difference to one’s outlook on things in life! even i, your relatively rational blog hostess, am given to squishy female emotions, so you know … our biologies color our opinions and our conclusions about the world … mine, too.

@hbd chick “from one of the rather inbred european groups.” Thanks. What can I say? I am maniacally outbred and you rather inbred and you are smarter than I. After all, I follow your blog with breathless attention. Nobody gives my blog the same. All mail is fan mail, eh what?

[…] to some ridiculous edit war, but are visible in earlier versions of the article, and are preserved here at HBD Chick’s blog), Lynn’s updated national IQs, and Heiner Rindermann’s, Michael Sailer’s, and […]

[…] One of the great mysteries in IQ research is why Indian Americans are such super achievers despite the fact that India reportedly has an IQ of only 82 according to the book IQ and Wealth of Nations. […]

[…] a continent as homogenous as Europe seemed to be cutting the data too thin. But then I looked at Lynn’s listing of national IQs. These figures are notoriously unreliable, often based on small unrepresentative samples, and […]

Sub-saharan level nutrition in india, caste endogamy, lack of decent education for most indians, and also…on whom in india were the tests conducted need to be taken into account (I remember reading somewhere that one IQ test was conducted on jungle tribes in india which gave a result of 70+ something IQ and one on low birth weight children in india). But i dont know about others. Even two tests with 70+ results can bring down the average iq of a country. (Assuming only two of these tests were conducted on population which will obvioulsy have a low IQ). If more of the other tests regarding india were like this that could explain the low IQ.